About

Lightly Used Testament began in the community of Church of the Good Shepherd, Ruxton: a simple idea that the sacred is often found in ordinary life — a kitchen table, a walk, a kindness, a prayer that felt far away and then, somehow, near.

Here, people share short personal stories in their own voices, in response to simple prompts. The stories are searchable, so a theme — grace, grief, gratitude, a place — can be found again later.

How it works

• Choose a prompt and record or write a story.
• A human moderator reads or listens to every story before anything is published.
• Published stories are public on this community's site. They are shared with other faith communities only if the storyteller opts in.

Safeguarding

Safeguarding lead: [to be named by Colin — placeholder]. Until a lead is named here, please contact the parish office of Church of the Good Shepherd, Ruxton with any safeguarding concern.

This site is for adults at launch. Stories about or from children are not accepted yet. If a story discloses abuse, self-harm, a crime, or a risk to someone, the moderator may not publish it and may need to pass it on — the site does not promise confidentiality in that case. To ask for a story to be removed, contact the safeguarding lead.

Copying this site for another community

One codebase, one community per deployment. Each community has its own stories, moderators, and consent records; nothing is shared between communities except stories whose tellers have explicitly opted in. See the project README for how to set up a copy.